Thursday, December 15, 2016

As another year starts winding down, it is always a good reminder to take stock of what you value. After 319 weekly chats in 6.5 years, #hpm chat is going on our first ever hiatus. This was a hard decision for Meredith MacMartin and myself, the two lead co-moderators. We have had numerous conversations about the sustainability of weekly #hpm chats going into 2017 with only two co-moderators. There is a lot of work that goes into developing weekly programming, making sure the hosts are ready, ensuring diverse topics and hosts, editing blog posts, and promoting the chat. And that is all before the chat gets going. So yes this is a lot of volunteer work, but…

We really love #hpm chat. And I know a lot of you love it too. It has been a great place to get inspired, learn about a new resource, become enlightened on a different way to look at a problem, and most of all to talk with friendship among #hpm chatters has been nothing short of amazing for the past six and a half years.

We really love #hpm chat. And I know that a lot of you love it too. It has provided professional and personal inspiration, access to new resources, different perspectives on problems we all face, and the opportunity to talk and build friendships with fellow #hpm chatters. That opportunity has been nothing short of amazing for the past six and a half years.

When the idea came up to do a weekly tweetchat around hospice and palliative medicine in 2010, Renee Berry and I were inspired by Dana Lewis and her #hcsm (Health Care in Social Media) chat on Sunday nights. At first, it was Renee and I leading nearly every chat all in an effort to teach clinicians about how to use Twitter, and to leverage this relatively new medium to educate the public about hospice and palliative care. Over time, more volunteers joined us as hosts and moderators as the community grew, and as

I do want to take a moment to recognize the other moderators that helped us over the years. A big thank you to Renee Berry, Alicia Bloom, Niamh Van Meines, Ashley Deringer and Meredith MacMartin. Our have been great partners and #hpm chat would not have had the impact without your countless hours of volunteer work and enthusiasm to spread the word about #hpm chat.

Meredith and I have some ideas on what we may want to do, but it may take some time to ramp up new co-moderators and set our new programming in a sustainable way for volunteers. We may be reaching out to some faithful chatters to get your take on the future of #hpm chat as well, so keep an eye out and follow the @hpmchat account on Twitter.

Christian Sinclair, MD, FAAHPM is the co-founder of #hpm chat and current co-moderator.

Pallimed: A Hospice & Palliative Medicine Blog Founded June 8, 2005.
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